Abstract

Various ecostratigraphic bioevents due to immigration or emigration of certain fish and amphibian species can be identified in the development of lacustrine faunas in the Saar-Nahe basin. Boy & Schindler (2000) have already described in detail the bioevents of the Remigiusberg invasion, the Altenglan diversity low, and the Wahnwegen faunal change; the latter can be related to an interval of tectonic activity (Franconian tectonic event). The following bioevents are documented here for the first time: • the Hausweiler faunal change in the basal Meisenheim Formation (M 1); • the Raumbach invasion in the middle Meisenheim Formation (M 5+6); • the Kappeln diversity peak, representing a short-term increase in biodiversity in lacustrine communities in the uppermost Meisenheim Formation (M 9 to M10); • the Jakobsweiler invasion in the upper Donnersberg Formation. Interregional comparisons are primarily made with the southwestern Saale basin and the Autun basin. – No definite evidence for the Hausweiler faunal change was observed in either of these two basins. The bioevent may have occurred in the basal Lower Goldlauter Formation of the Saale basin and in the Couche de Muse of the Autun basin. It is preceded by an interval of significant coal formation during the deposition of the Lauterecken Formation in the Saar-Nahe basin and of the Manebach Formation in the Saale basin. - The Raumbach invasion can be identified in the basal Upper Goldlauter Formation of the Saale basin, as well as at the transition from the Surmoulin to the Millery Formation in the Autun basin. - Presumably the Kappeln diversity peak coincides more or less with the Gottlob level of the Upper Goldlauter Formation and the Télots level of the Millery Formation. Additional possible correlations are with the Buxière Formation in the Bourbon l’Archambault basin of France and the Zbonek-Svitavka horizons of the Boskovice furrow of Moravia. A pronounced progradation of fluvial facies into the basin centers can be identified in all three basins: the Oberkirchen Formation in the Saar-Nahe basin, the base of the Upper Oberhof Formation in the Saale basin, and the basal Curgy Formation in the Autun basin. – Basin-specific volcanism commenced higher in the section in both German basins – at the base of the Donnersberg Formation in the Saar-Nahe basin and in the lower part of the Lower Oberhof Formation of the Saale basin. – The Jakobsweiler invasion is documented in the upper part of the Upper Oberhof Formation as well as in der Niederhäslich Formation of the Döhlen basin in Saxony and in some basins in the Czech Republic. – A stratigraphic hiatus between the Upper Oberhof Formation and the Rotterode Formation in the Saale basin reflects a tectonically-generated change in topography. It corresponds to the expansion of the fanglomeratic marginal facies of the basal Wadern Formation into the center of the Saar-Nahe basin.